I lay on the stage, repeating the sentence in my mind as if repetition might make it comprehensible. But the words remained completely unreal to me, detached from any kind of meaning they might try to convey. Overhead, clouds passed slowly in a stratospheric breeze, and I felt as far away from earth as they were.
“Okay, Sinead, let’s hear it,” called Sean.
“She just went to get some water,” Danny answered.
“Oh, well, that’s great then,” said Sean. “I guess we’ll all sit around twiddling our thumbs while we wait for Her Highness to return.”
“Just give me a second and I’ll do it,” Declan said. He was taping wires down with bright blue tape.
“How about you, Jules? You don’t exactly seem to be overworked.”
I sat up. “What?”
Sean was standing next to the guy at the soundboard, his arms crossed over his chest, a beer in one hand. “Talk into the mic,” Sean said. “Testing: one, two. Just like in the movies.”
I got to my feet, crossed the stage, and stood at the microphone. The perfect lawn stretched out all around me, as if the stage were a ship floating on a broad emerald ocean. Beyond the edge of the hill, the actual water appeared, then disappeared into the horizon.
“Testing: one, two,” I said. “Testing: one, two.” There was a loud screech, and suddenly Danny was at my side.
“Here,” he said, moving the stand about a foot away from where it had been. “Try this.”
“Thanks,” I said, following him and standing at the mic in its new location.
“Keep going,” Sean called out.
“Um, testing. One. Two. Testing.” On the second testing, my voice boomed out, shockingly loud.
“You’re killing me with that testing,” said Sean. “Sing something. Sing ‘Happy Birthday.’”
Obediently, I started singing. “Happy birthday to you. Happy birthday to you. Happy birthday dear … someone. Happy birthday to you.”
There was silence. In the distance, Sinead appeared, a pyramid of water bottles balanced in her arms.
“Let’s have that again,” said Sean, but he didn’t say it with quite the same venom with which he’d said everything else.
I sang “Happy Birthday” one more time. By the time I was finished, Sinead was standing beside Sean. “Holy shit,” she called out. “Jules, you have a great voice.”
“Thanks,” I said.
“No joke, Jules,” said Danny from over by the drums. “You can really sing.”
“Okay,” I said, not really able to process their compliments. They were all staring at me. “Do you need me to sing it again?”
“Ah, yeah,” said the sound guy, who had a mustache so big I was pretty sure it was ironic. “If you could sing it one more time, that would be great.”
I sang the song for a third time. It didn’t sound like anything special, certainly no different than it sounded every other time I’d sung it. When I was finished, everyone clapped. I felt weird standing up there with people looking at me, so I just asked if we were finished, went over to the edge of the stage, and sat down.
When it was time for the concert to start, everyone but me went off to change. Contrary to gender stereotypes, Sinead was the first one done, wearing a tight black dress and a pair of high-heeled black pumps. She stood at the edge of the parking lot, and a minute later the boys joined her. They walked toward the stage, where I was sitting, the guys in black suits and white shirts, Sinead in her dress. I wondered what it was like to be a member of their let’s-be-in-a-band-together-and-bicker-but-really-all-get-along-and-love-each-other family. You could tell just by looking at them that all of their parents were happily married, that nobody in their family had tried to commit suicide or overdosed, that they gathered around the piano at holidays and sang seasonal songs.
I kind of hated all of them.
I looked out at the lawn. Little lights were strung up in the few trees scattered picturesquely across the grounds. People were wandering around eating hors d’oeuvres and drinking from tall glasses. All of them looked happy and carefree, enjoying a warm summer’s night at their club. I wondered what would happen if I opened my mouth, started screaming, and refused to stop. Would the roasted-egg guy throw me out? Would he have me arrested?
Would the police put me in a hospital bed with restraints on my arms?
My phone buzzed and I picked it up. Sofia.
Sofia: how r u?
I reread our previous exchanges.
Sofia: how r u?
Me: im ok.
Sofia: how r u?
Me: i am okay.
Here it was for the third time, and I typed a new response.
Me: i am fucking freaking out, sofia, how do you think I am?
I stared at the screen of my phone.
Don’t make a scene, Juliet.
I deleted what I’d just typed. im ok, I wrote, and I put the phone back on the stage beside me.
“God, this crowd is ancient,” said Sinead, standing at the edge of the stage next to where I was sitting with my legs hanging down.
“We’ll have them rocking in the aisles,” said Declan, surveying the audience along with her. When they were standing next to each other, it was clear how much Declan and Sinead looked alike—even more than they looked like Danny and Sean and Sean and Danny looked like each other. Declan and Sinead even stood the same way, both arms crossed over their chests, each hand holding the opposite bicep.
“Are you guys twins?” I asked, staring at them.
“Irish twins,” said Sinead. Her teeth were very white against her bright red lipstick. “We’re eleven months apart. And Danny’s our little brother. He’s going into first form.”
“They don’t call it that here,” said Sean, who was standing on the ground just below us. The way he said it made me think it wasn’t the first time he’d had to tell her. “It’s ninth grade. And you are going to be a junior and Declan’s going to be a senior.” He popped open the beer he was holding.
“Right,” said Sinead, snapping her fingers. “Junior. Senior. It sounds so American.”
“We are American,” Declan reminded her. He gave me an apologetic look. “We’ve been living in Beijing for the past seven years. Our dad just got transferred back to New York in June.”
“Start spreading the news!” Sean sang, and he took a swig of beer.
“I thought you were British,” I said, confused. “You have British accents.”
Sinead laughed. “We were born in London. We lived there before we moved to Beijing.”
The sound guy came over to the stage. “Okay, you guys start at nine?” His mustache was truly astonishing.
“That we do,” said Sean.
“I guess it’s time, then,” said the guy. “Break a leg.”
“Thanks,” said Sinead.
Suddenly everyone was moving around the stage, gathering instruments, talking into a mic, doing a quick roll on the drums. I felt idiotic sitting up there and being in the way. I hopped off the stage just as Declan called out, “Hey! Jules!”
I turned around. He was holding a tambourine out in my direction. “Do you want to play with us?”
I